Fromont and Risler — Complete eBook

She was talking with animation. Frantz, deeply
moved, drew near to listen.

“No, no cream. The ‘cafe parfait’
will be enough. Be sure that it’s well
frozen and ready at seven o’clock. Oh! about
an entree—­let us see—­”

She was holding council with her cook concerning the
famous dinner-party for the next day. Her brother-in-law’s
sudden appearance did not disconcert her.

“Ah! good-morning, Frantz,” she said very
coolly. “I am at your service directly.
We’re to have some people to dinner to-morrow,
customers of the firm, a grand business dinner.
You’ll excuse me, won’t you?”

Fresh and smiling, in the white ruffles of her trailing
morning-gown and her little lace cap, she continued
to discuss her menu, inhaling the cool air that rose
from the fields and the river. There was not the
slightest trace of chagrin or anxiety upon that tranquil
face, which was a striking contrast to the lover’s
features, distorted by a night of agony and fatigue.

For a long quarter of an hour Frantz, sitting in a
corner of the salon, saw all the conventional dishes
of a bourgeois dinner pass before him in their regular
order, from the little hot pates, the sole Normande
and the innumerable ingredients of which that dish
is composed, to the Montreuil peaches and Fontainebleau
grapes.

At last, when they were alone and he was able to speak,
he asked in a hollow voice:

“Didn’t you receive my letter?”

“Why, yes, of course.”

She had risen to go to the mirror and adjust a little
curl or two entangled with her floating ribbons, and
continued, looking at herself all the while:

“Yes, I received your letter. Indeed, I
was charmed to receive it. Now, should you ever
feel inclined to tell your brother any of the vile
stories about me that you have threatened me with,
I could easily satisfy him that the only source of
your lying tale-bearing was anger with me for repulsing
a criminal passion as it deserved. Consider yourself
warned, my dear boy—­and au revoir.”

As pleased as an actress who has just delivered a
telling speech with fine effect, she passed him and
left the room smiling, with a little curl at the corners
of her mouth, triumphant and without anger. And
he did not kill her!

CHAPTER XVII

AN ITEM OF NEWS

In the evening preceding that ill-omened day, a few
moments after Frantz had stealthily left his room
on Rue de Braque, the illustrious Delobelle returned
home, with downcast face and that air of lassitude
and disillusionment with which he always met untoward
events.

Before replying, the ex-actor, who never failed to
precede his most trivial words with some facial play,
learned long before for stage purposes, dropped his
lower lip, in token of disgust and loathing, as if
he had just swallowed something very bitter.